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Yes it's the negative edge. You should just learn to release the button faster.
You can also HOLD the MP button and hit the kick buttons while holding it to avoid n.edge, I don't think it's optimal but who knows, maybe it's going to work better for you.

Anyway you should also practice doing the super motion faster so you can do the whole motion after hitting cMP.
Being able to execute the super motion faster is helpful in combos, but even more for using the super as a whiff punisher and such

Took me hours and hours of practice just getting TC>SA3 down and I'm still not 100% on it.
Personally I've given up on hit-confirms for now and focus on learning to punish unsafe stuff for now.
I think all the moves have to become second nature in order to be hit-confirmable.

Not saying what I do is the right thing, but practicing combos and trying to find applications for them in real matches seems to be more realistic and more productive for me than trying to hit-confirm stuff I still have to focus on a lot to get it right.

take your time and do not rage if you can't do it. Some people are more gifted for execution and learn in a lot less time, but with time and patience you'll handle it, don't give up.
I'm totally not gifted for execution, in my early years I grinded the training mode to no end, and in the long run the results came.
Nowadays I became lazy and barely train thus my execution is worse even though I got better on other aspects of the game :P

Guys I'm ashamed to ask in the Newbie Dojo and also because I know most people answering there are newbies who don't have a clue what they're talking about like myself.

The questions I have are in regards to the arcade stick usage.

Problem number 1 is I'm trying to take my arcade stick seriously, since I want to become good at execution. I recently noticed when I practiced bread and butters that I actually use my palm to do qcf motions from 1P side and that my fingers remain stiff from 2P side when doing the same motion, using my wrist to spin the stick around.
Often times that ends up with my ending on the corners of my 4-gate, especially when I'm under pressure and tend to do the motions with more force. (I'm using the wineglass grip if that's of any interest)
When I tried using only my fingers to move the stick, I noticed that it became much easier to do 2xqcf quickly and cleanly.
On top of that I saw a Gootecks video where he showed how he is using the stick and it seems that he's only using his fingers as well. Then I check out an Umehara hands closeup video and it looked like he was doing the same. How do you guys use the stick and should I relearn what I seemingly learned wrong over 2 years now?

Secondly I have trouble with right hand movement. In the same two videos both players seem to use only 2 fingers for button presses, except when they're pianoing or doing supers/ultras. Daigo seems to double tap every single button press and Gootecks explained that you should use 2 fingers to hit a single button.
I myself hit every button with one finger only and I can double tap but I cannot double tap combos at all because I can't hit the buttons fast enough. Also both never use the thumb except for teching throws (and I guess universal overheads in 3S), so when they hit shorts they actually use the index and ring finger.

Basically what I wanna know is how you guys who consider yourself great at execution handle the stick and if I learned it all wrong and should start over in order to achieve my long term goal to actually get good at execution.

Even though I don't use it I think wine glass method is most efficient (like daigo). Palming the stick is probably not such a good method. If you can get used to double tapping most button presses that's probably a good idea, but I think how many fingers you use for buttons might be character dependent?

dude when ffa/denjin had those 8 way sticks it was the best thing in the world. Maybe the clickers or whatever weren't 8way but that square base was at least. I can't stand the square gate sticks, I'd rather just use an american style p360 but my favorite will always be the eight way. If the stick isn't properly adjusted, it becomes practically impossible to pull of anything without some margin of error to combat mid execution. Using the square gates, that is.

edit: lemme elaborate a bit.

if you're playing on a flat surface like that of a astro city cab or a fight stick on the floor, square gate is just fine. If you're playing on an inclined surface like on the american style cab you might want to use a circle gate.. When I mentioned the octagonal gate I was referring the astro city cabs. Finding your way out of the corner of one those square gates while playing on an incline is a fucking hassle. Mainly because every single corner has to be used a different way and wrists will eventually get tired. Of course, it's not japanese canon anymore to use anything but square gates, I'm guessing the preference is political in nature or something, so if you want to just avoid the dealing with naysayers altogether go the square route.

I just remembered how it felt using the 8 way sticks at denjin and I got a burst of nostalgia....ahhhh~~

Gonna sound lame but you have to keep practicing. Unfortunately, getting good at 3S is like working out, you need to practice and think about this stuff pretty frequently if you are lacking competition and natural talent. I'm still bad at this game but I'm a lot better than where I was when I started. Now, I'm the official PSN 3SOE underdog killer

I just don't think switching gates makes a significant difference. It's 99% how much you've practiced. And since most 3s cabs will be on square anyway, might as well practice on the standard. I guess if you've already got an octagon laying around, why not give it a lash? I don't think either one is necessarily superior... although p360's are horrible! I'd rather use a triangle gate

Build as much meter as you can? Go all out because openings to hit them and big combos give meter anyway and even better than that, positioning?

Trying to make room to meter build won't work anyway if they don't give you that, and its probably bad to think more in a real match. Just want to hear more opinions on what you guys do.

1999 = "A Game with Parries isn't Street Fighter"
2016 = "Releasing a Complete Game isn't Street Fighter"
You wouldn't even understand if I told you.
People will forget what you said.
People will forget what you did.
But, people will never forget how you made them feel.

Build as much meter as you can? Go all out because openings to hit them and big combos give meter anyway and even better than that, positioning?

Trying to make room to meter build won't work anyway if they don't give you that, and its probably bad to think more in a real match. Just want to hear more opinions on what you guys do.

You have asked a very complex question that requires more specific information for me to provide you with a worthwhile answer. All I can say is that my goal is to win the second round and leave myself in the best possible position to win the third. Meter management is probably the key term here, although how much meter matters can vary depending on character and match-up.

Saving meter is character dependent and also player preference. I know mester strongly believes in using meter to win (even if he's not yun). But if you watch a RX he'll save gauge for the next round at times.

Hey ive been playing fighting games for about a decade for fun, but ive never been really good.
Right now the games I have to practice on are
s2hd remix
3rd strike
ssf4ae
guilty gear xrd
cvs2

I am used to games like gg and mk where you can just sort of.... tactically mash buttons (as opposed to blind mashing) and generally win against shitty players...

but when I started playing xrd I noticed I was losing every single match online. To pick up on some better fundementals I started playing vs cpu in sf2turbo, but nobody was ever online, so I transitioned over to third strike. Third strike is my favorite fighting game ever really, but lord I am terrible.

I generally try to avoid shotos because they feel bland (though i grab ken or akuma if the matchup is really bad). I am mostly trying to learn alex but I get my ass kicked 90 percent of the time, and Im not sure what mistakes im making. He doesnt really have combos more difficult than 2-3 hits..... maybe its his slow speed? Im not sure if im not hitconfirming right, or if my footsies suck... (alex has terrible footsies in general)
The only times i ever seem to win are when im akuma and airball cheese against mediocre players. YES I do go to training mode, YES I do look up character strategies, and yes I play vs cpu first. For third strike ive also been watching pikachuakuma to see some good gameplay b/c top tier players stick with cheeseball characters like yun, (I also read the entire ebook "how to not suck at fighting games")

Also learning to parry hasnt been too easy. I cant parry kens shoryu in parry challenge 3. The first hit i can 50/50 parry, but the timing between the hits doesnt make sense to me. Is it the same timing as when the hits normally connect? A little early? is there a pause due to the parry animation? hm....
doesn't help most of the players have been playing close to a decade online ;p

Id play more AE, but I really dislike sf4 for some reason. I cant place my finger but its just not fun to me. too much dependence on links? Also I get my ass kicked there too (oops)

i am not entirely sure exactly what to ask here. Any advice in general.

EDIT Yeah I know Yun and Li are really high tier and if I want to git gud I should prolly main one of them
but I really would rather not. Im not a tourney competitor so I like to pick my chars based on fun-factor
and to me the characters with the most seem to be

I'm pretty crappy compared to a lot of people here, and I've only been playing about a year and a half, and mostly online, but here's some advicce anyway.

Don't call Yun a cheeseball character. Ken is considered better than Yun by some of the best players these days, or at least as good. Yun is also really hard to learn how to use well, where other characters have a much easier time cheesing in lag (Urien and Alex especially). I suppose that's just my opinion, but even doing Yun's bnb (and finding legit ways to start it) seems way harder to me than any other character's mandatory damage dealing methods. Also, people drop on Yun a lot, which is pretty frustrating for me especially, because I have way too many subs, and I'm not even good with Yun so usually when I'm winning I feel like I deserve it...

Also, don't get hung up on parries at this stage of the game. Learning to block well is way more important. Learn how to parry stuff in training mode, sure, but don't be too stressed about using it. Parrying is almost always a risk. Knowing how to parry stuff is great, but it's not mandatory very often. If you watch high level play, you'll see a lot less parrying than you see from a lot of online players. Honestly, I still suck at it a lot, but I'm at least good enough that I win around 60% of my ranked matches; which is sort of a meaningless statistic, but it's better than the 1/4 I was sitting at for the first few months I played. I don't understand how some people parry so much online, because in lag I can't even parry spammed moves consistently.

For you main, basically everyone except Sean and Twelve are viable, but if you actually want to get good at the game please do not use either of them. The odds of there being a breakthrough 16 years into this game's life for either of them seems quite low. I'd mess around with learning bnbs and basic gameplay strats for whoever you find fun, and when you start feeling like you're using somebody correctly, stick with that character. That's what I did with Dudley, anyway. He was the 5th character I tried to main, and things went better with him than Yang, Q, Akuma, or Yun pretty much instantly, so I stuck with him. I still sub way too many characters, but I try to at least use Dudley somewhat every time I play.

Oh, and don't try to start out with Akuma either, he's too complicated. Learn Ken or Ryu before learning Akuma, because their basics apply. People told me that, and I got super angry, thinking they were being condescending. But it turns out its true. Akuma has tons of tricks that there's no sense in learning at the point of the game you're at. You'll always be able to cheese some people with jump back fireballs online (I still struggle against it with dudley sometimes), but that kind of play doesn't foster improvement. Also, pretty much everybody online (including me, when used him) gets way too greedy with Raging Demon and KKZ. They are RARELY worth using. His SA1 is a better option 90%+ of the time. His EX supers are satisfying, but very hard to guarantee. People use them as hail marrys way too much online, and you'll wind up throwing the match against players who are paying attention. I can't tell you how many times I've been about to lose to an Akuma, but I won instead because I baited KKZ, which gave me free EX machinegun combo.

you should focus on less games and less characters. pick a character and stick with it. no matter who you pick there are videos of top players playing that character (besides Sean). try to understand what they do, try to do the things they do, and if you don't understand why they don't work for you, you can come back here with more specific questions It's very hard to give people generic tips to improve. If you're a real beginner you just have a lot of legwork in front of you.

Focus on the basics first, it's going to make you better at playing any character and even any game. Learn when to push what buttons(and at what ranges), learn to anti-air, learn to punish things on whiff and block, learn basic offensive mix-up patterns. Play a character you like, regardless of whether the character is considered strong or weak: it doesn't matter much before people start getting really good.

Don't bother with parrying before you've got the basics down. It's a great tool when you understand how the game "flows", but it's probably going to get you killed a lot before you reach that level.

I have a question about typical forward-moving specials (Alex elbows, Urien tackles, Q dash attacks, Yun Lungepunch, Remy blue-something-kick, probably others): how safe/unsafe do they tend to be on block? I know Alex's elbows are pretty bad on block, and Q is semi-safe but negative, but I have no idea about the other ones. I've seen a lot of good Uriens in particular just throw out tackles, so I'm a bit curious to how safe that is as Urien is a character I like quite a bit myself.

I read on here and other places on the internet that some players like to practice using arcade mode. Sounds like a good idea but I was wondering what should I focus on when playing arcade mode. Here are things I can think of:
-Spacing/Ground Game
-Punishing any unsafe move at a moment's notice
-Hit confirming and continuing offense

Spacing/ground game is something I think you need a human opponent to practice against, simply because an entity that reads your inputs and has a preprogrammed AI will play a completely different game compared to a human.
Case in point: one of my training partners in ST played a guy who was a high-score monster in that game, as in "perfect the fuck out of every CPU and then beat Shin Akuma". He was extremely proficient at playing against the AI, but he got completely destroyed when he tried to play an actual human being that reacted completely differently in almost any scenario.

As for punishing stuff and hit-confirming? Yeah, arcade works for that.

After some games yesterday where a lot of my losses stemmed from getting jumped in on, or rather getting my attempted AA option beaten, I've realized I need to change my approach to the anti-air game. I usually expend a lot of my focus on the ground game to get whiff punishes/dash in throws and tend to not react as well as I'd like to people taking to the air. I've mitigated this weakness for quite some time by trying to space myself at the end of the jump arc of my opponent to get a clean DP that's easy to react to (i.e. the ST approach), but as people have gotten better, this approach seems worse and worse, especially since I'm not really standing at that spot anymore when playing the ground game / trying to get in.

The options I tend to use with Ken, and the disadvantages I can see with each of them, are:
- DP (gets beaten by parries, seems to trade against Q j.HK often which is not in my favor, and I'm really bad at doing them on reaction if I'm crouching when the jump comes)
- c.HP/s.HP (somewhat slow, easily parried for massive damage, loses/trades often, seems like the lazy option)
- EX air tatsu (strictly prediction, requires meter, great damage though)
- nj.MK (usually prediction, really bad if they didn't jump)
- jump-back j.HK (gives up space, requires early reaction)
- dash-under into throw/combo (prediction. Also gives a million style points when done successfully)
- trip-guard c.HK / c.MK xx super (only guaranteed if they whiffed their jump-in, great against air-tatsus though)

One option I realize I don't use enough is OS parry into jab. I thought a bit about it last night, and it seems like a really hard option to beat, and possibly one that nets me a mix-up afterwards, even though the damage itself is abysmal, so it starts making sense when people say that s.LP is the best AA in the game (though I assume there's usually a parry OS in there as well). Is there anything to this option that I should know before I start trying to implement it? And are there any other good AA options I'm missing out on?

- DP (gets beaten by parries, seems to trade against Q j.HK often which is not in my favor, and I'm really bad at doing them on reaction if I'm crouching when the jump comes)

If Q is jumping at you with that. block or get out of the way.

Consider, looking at Q sometime, to understand. He can't do anything huge from a jump in, really unless he hits that. You block that or aren't even there, then what is he going to do? Just flail or put himself in a bad position by even wanting to jump at you in a neutral position where you have all the options.

If its online, say so considering latency removes options and jumps occur more for risk reward.

You can go deeper and look at how he might use that as a block tick to make you stand there and not be prepared for CDB Command Grab. So you don't want to try backdash after blocking, but back dash before he kicks you is fine. Since you may be in a bad spot to commit. Like already in the corner. But I guess you need to explain more on how that's not in your favor, like you are too late and eating the fat combo, or what happened after he got sent down with the trade that even helped him. Since him getting knocked out of the air with a special should be a knockdown for you. Its not a position where he gets to combo off of the trade.

- dash-under into throw/combo (prediction. Also gives a million style points when done successfully)

Not really a prediction. You can react to jumps fine, where that's considered now they made a mistake and dash under only if they gave you the room to do that and they're not already all over you incoming. Versus jumping on you waking up, them doing it in that position being meaty forcing it on you, not giving you the room/time to dash. They had the advantage to set it up and take away those options.

There was a player who trained himself to dash on reaction, I think to just jump backs, he talked about once. There's no reason why you couldn't do the same to jump forward. Or in your way remember tendencies of a player, and what they can do + what they like to do here, so even though its a prediction, its an educated one you expected in that situation.

1999 = "A Game with Parries isn't Street Fighter"
2016 = "Releasing a Complete Game isn't Street Fighter"
You wouldn't even understand if I told you.
People will forget what you said.
People will forget what you did.
But, people will never forget how you made them feel.

yeah as haxalot said on walk unders it has everything to do with just knowing when they decide to jump if they're close enough to make it or not.
it's a prediction on the jumpers part not the one being jumped-in on. the jumper is expecting you to do something like throw out a normal and wants to get a fat jump-in combo. risky.

When I said that the DP trade with Q j.HK wasn't in my favor, I meant damage wise. MP or HP DP definitely do less damage than a j.HK on a trade, LP I believe is closer but still does less damage that what I'm trading with.

It should also be noted that a lot of the problems I'm mentioning here comes from playing that very same Q-player offline, and 70% of my losses against him comes from him getting a jump-in. He makes a point of not trying to play the mid-range game against me and therefore jumps a lot, and a lot of the time I'm not getting the good end of the bargain when he does. After seeing your responses here, it just makes it even more clear that this problem is entirely my own fault for having sloppy AAs / making bad decisions in the AA department.

If that's often an issue for you just try crouching when he jumps in. Because you're crouching the only timing when the jump in will hit is smaller, meaning your timing for a successful parry becomes more obvious/easier (he can't do an early jump in to mess with you since you're too low to be hit).

Also since Q's fierce/roundhouse are so pretty slow you'll see it coming since he will have to do it long before he is anywhere near the ground.

So, new random question: when you guys decide to go for a parry, what factors influence that decision? Currently I'm mostly using parries in a rather limited fashion, i.e. punishing telegraphed moves, or as part of semi-gimmicky setups (like using a negative-on-block move up close -> parry). Most my attempts to be fancy or clever with parries beyond that end up me getting hit by something, so I think my decision making behind parrying needs some thought.

It's really not like that is I guess what I would say. There aren't default spots or anything imo.
It depends entirely on your opponent and how well you can understand their rhythm and the kinds of things they prefer.

You get a bit of a read and then you start throwing them out in places where if you don't actually parry, nothing negative happens.
Then you start parrying them a bit and then they start looking to punish your parries, etc. x infinity.

You could classify those in the way you kind of did but the why is much more important. If you start looking at your play and you don't have a really good reason as to why you tried to parry in a certain spot, that really indicates you're using parry in a way which can be turned against you.

Started playing 3rd strike a few days ago, I feel like I'm getting gimmicked out by a few things since i'm just too unfamiliar

Urien's headbutts: Am I supposed to parry those on reaction or prediction?
Oro: Goofy ass jump arc altering moves, don't really know how to approach anti airing him
Remy: That dive kick move he has, should I be parrying those on reaction?

Also is there any info I can find on punishing moves in general? I only have a slight idea on what's punishable and what isn't

If you've only been playing for a few days, I'd hate you if you were parrying ANYTHING on reaction. In what situation would you be parrying Urien's headbutt on reaction? It's fast. It's also not a very viable reversal. Even the ex version tends to only trade with meaties. Oro being hard to anti-air is kind of his thing. Cold blue kick is weird, if it were easier to parry people wouldn't use it so much. If you've only been playing for a few days, parrying should be used almost exclusively for hadoukens, and in chip death situations. Blocking is underrated.

youre not supposed to parry headbutts unless youre already in the air and you have to. planning your strategy around urien's unique tools like headbutt is part of the challenge of the urien matchup. headbutt has some main characteristics to note:

-beats throws (not on the first frame, but still)
-goes over lows
-can anti-air opponents who are on the way up or down
-is briefly vulnerable when he lands
-if it doesnt hit, will typically lead to urien throwing if he lands within throw range

so, keep a mental note that you have to use moves differently against urien based on those traits. the footsie game is modified because he can go over lows, oki throws or tick throws are riskier, poorly planned jumps can lead to knockdown or a full combo, etc. know all of this in advance and have answers to it. your oki game will be changed to compensate for headbutt and the value of a close range wakeup parry for urien. no version of headbutt will ever trade with meaties, otherwise it wasnt a meaty.

oro can only double jump once, so if he does this, he cant alter his trajectory again. imo reactive air to airs shut down mediocre oros. use early j.hk with shotos, j.mp/hp with dudley, etc. or dash underneath and anti air from the other side or get him to land on a low.

cbk is annoying because it counts as an air move, so the parry timing is stricter. same reason why tsurugi and certain other air moves are hard to parry. parrying it slightly later than you would expect works pretty well for me. unfortunately, unless all other aspects of your game are godly, this is one of those "you have to know how to parry this" moves.

- about Ducking xx Super, about how early in the ducking animation do you have to cancel into the super? And which version of the Ducking is recommended for this?
- are there any shortcuts to be used for the HCF in c.MP xx ducking xx super? Or do you have to actually input it as d+MP, b, HCF, K to get the c.MP cancelled into ducking? I thought I got it a few times without leaving d/b, but I couldn't get it consistently.
- When doing f.HK - SA3, is it common that one of the hits of the super whiffs? I think I've got the link down ~90% of the time, but even when the dummy doesn't block, it often registers as 5 hits rather than 6, so I'm not quite sure. I do piano the super, in case there's any difference between the versions.

Really having fun with Duds. It's a long time since last I found a character that made me want to practice combos in any game.

- about Ducking xx Super, about how early in the ducking animation do you have to cancel into the super? And which version of the Ducking is recommended for this?

LK and MK versions have different speeds and travel distances. MK gives you a reasonable amount of time to confirm, but downside is you can be punished if they block (occasionally can be helped if you space yourself max distance). Depending on the timing of the cancel and the strength you use, you must also use the proper SA3 strength. LP hardly moves you forward, HP moves you forward a great deal. Just practice and think about when and why you use duck. Generally, stMP/crMP -> LK duck and stHK -> MK duck are the most commonly used ones.

- are there any shortcuts to be used for the HCF in c.MP xx ducking xx super? Or do you have to actually input it as d+MP, b, HCF, K to get the c.MP cancelled into ducking? I thought I got it a few times without leaving d/b, but I couldn't get it consistently.

In general, you want your movements as clean and precise as possible. As such, you should be doing:

crMP (neutral) HCF (kick) HCF (punch)

Getting neutral in between directionals is highly advised, as you will be hitting neutral quite often in high level gameplay as a result of neutral game movement. It also discourages sloppy inputs, which is just bad in general as it lends to much more executional mistakes.

- When doing f.HK - SA3, is it common that one of the hits of the super whiffs? I think I've got the link down ~90% of the time, but even when the dummy doesn't block, it often registers as 5 hits rather than 6, so I'm not quite sure. I do piano the super, in case there's any difference between the versions.

Unless I'm mistaken, it should never be 5 hits. Depending on who you do it against and at what ranges and which version of the SA you go with, there will be inconsistencies (Makoto is a big culprit) that lead you to not linking it. If you land the HK from afar, you have to account for the extra distance you created which must be covered by the SA3 (if you hit it far, you must use HP version...). Generally speaking, just never make it 5 hits!

Regarding Cr mp duck cork, you can just roll the stick from back to crouch (hit mp) and then towards drum super. It's the same with necro cr lk hooks. There is no neutral needed.

Dart cork can be 5 hits in rare scenarios where you get the first 4 and miss the last one. 1+4. Basically as long as the first hit connects after dart you got it. Vs makoto it doesn't connect unless you're right on top of her. That's why some dudleys use rocket against her.

Did some more testing. The 5-hit thing was just the 3SOE-dummy being... well, a dummy. For some reason it doesn't auto-block the first frame after hitstun, so the super won't get blocked if I miss the link by 1 frame. This didn't happen if I plugged in a second stick and jammed it in downback so that the dummy would crouchblock. Which is probably what I'll do if I practice combos on OE in the future, because this shit annoyed me.
So, what I thought was 90% consistency was more like 60-70%, it turns out. Sads. I need to practice more then.

The reason why I asked about c.MP xx Ducking without leaving crouch was because that would make it a lot easier to do it if I'm using c.MP defensively, as it means I won't let go of downback. This means there's a lot more commitment to doing c.MP xx ducking xx super defensively. Oh well.